Daily Archives: April 11, 2007

Stalin had a word for it: Kompromat. it is now being used against Angus MacNeil, the Scottish Nationalist MP who launched the “Cash for Honours” scandal that may well put some of Blair’s top aides in jail, probably for their destruction of evidence.

This account from the “This is London” website makes the parallel with the smear campaign against me. I would add that, after a four month investigation loaded against me in every possible way, I was found not guilty of all the allegations against me.

For American readers, the age of consent in the UK is 16, so MacNeil is not accused of anything illegal. MacNeil has come clean and said he was “Wrong and stupid” to romp with the girls. That is a question of personal morality. Having seen their photos, I think he is a lucky man with excellent taste.

The MP who triggered the police investigation into cash-for-peerages is the suspected victim of a sinister smear campaign, it has been claimed.

Scottish Nationalist MP Angus Macneil was forced to apologise to his wife and family after admitting to a ‘drunken romp’ with two teenage girls.

But in a dramatic twist, SNP party leader Alex Salmond suggested the MP had been spied on by MI5 as a result of the honours inquiry.

Mr Salmond said Mr Macneil had made the ‘most extraordinary powerful enemies’ after the inquiry probed the highest levels of Downing Street.

His complaint to the Metropolitan Police has triggered a 13-month probe which has seen Tony Blair interviewed twice by detectives and fundraiser Lord Levy and top No10 aide Ruth Turner arrested.

Two police forces confirmed they had investigated complaints of ‘intense intrusion’ against Mr Macneil but said no crimes had been detected.

The Metropolitan Police revealed it had investigated an allegation of a break-in to Mr Macneil’s Commons office after claims it had been ‘swept’ in a covert spying operation, but found no evidence.

Yet the alleged incidents bear striking similiarities to the treatment of former ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, who claimed he was the victim of dirty tricks by MI6 after speaking out against US foreign policy in the former Soviet state.

After he accused Britain of being complicit in the torture of terrorist suspects by American forces, stories emerged of Mr Murray’s affair with a 22-year-old dancer, which the diplomat admitted, and accusations that he offered visas in return for sex, which he denied.

A Sunday newspaper revealed that Mr Macneil ‘kissed and fondled’ two teenage girls in a hotel room in July 2005.